McCarthy Power Plant

The McCarthy Power Plant, also known as the Mother Lode Coalition Mining Company Power House and the Mother Lode Plant, is a historic power plant building in the small community of McCarthy, Alaska, in the heart of Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve. It is a three-story wood frame structure with a clerestory roof, located on the banks of McCarthy Creek. It was built in 1917, after the arrival of the Copper River and Northwestern Railway in the area kicked of a building boom. The coal-fired power plant was built to provide electricity for the operation of a tramway and other facilities of the Kennecott mines. Most of the transmission lines and the tramway were destroyed by avalanches in 1919, and other changes made soon afterward made the power plant unnecessary, and its turbine was moved up to Kennecott.[2]

McCarthy Power Plant
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
Alaska Heritage Resources Survey
Location	West side of Shushanna Avenue, on McCarthy Creek, McCarthy, Alaska
Coordinates	61°25′56″N 142°55′35″W
Area	less than one acre
Built	1917 (1917)
Built by	Mother Lode Coalition Mining Company
NRHP reference No.	79003752[1]
AHRS No.	XMC-035
Significant dates
Added to NRHP	April 26, 1979
Designated AHRS	November 20, 1977

The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979.[1]

See also

• National Register of Historic Places listings in Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve
• National Register of Historic Places listings in Valdez-Cordova Census Area, Alaska

References

1. "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. July 9, 2010.
2. "NRHP nomination for McCarthy Power Plant". National Park Service. Retrieved 2014-12-19.